[Surgical indications for thoracotomy in cases of small advanced lung cancer by use of DNA content analysis and mediastinoscopy].

Twenty-seven patients with small advanced lung cancer were treated at Kyoto Katsura Hospital. Of 27 patients, 19 patients underwent thoracotomy. The mean survival time of the 19 resected patients was 49 months, while that of the 8 unresected patients was 36 months. There was no statistically significant difference between these mean survival times. Of the 19 resected patients, 6 patients underwent a relative curative operation (RCO), 4 patients underwent a relative noncurative operation, and 9 patients underwent an absolute noncurative operation. The respective mean survival times were 79 months, 30, and 33. We compared the mean survival time of RCO cases with that of the unresected cases, and there was a significant difference in favor of the RCO cases. So we recommend thoracotomy for patients with small advanced lung cancer if RCO is possible, and that requires of a histological classification of less than N2. We performed mediastinoscopy for 18 of the 27 patients to check for mediastinal lymph node metastasis, and 16 of those patients were confirmed to have metastasis pathologically. Mediastinoscopy is useful and reliable for confirming lymph node metastasis, because it gives us a pathological diagnosis. We also performed DNA content analysis on the 19 resected cases. There were 7 DNA diploidy cases, 11 DNA aneuploidy cases, and 1 case couldn't be determined. There was no significant difference between the mean survival times of DNA diploidy cases and the DNA aneuploidy cases.